Travel and photography is a passion of mine. Unfortunately it's not something I get to do nearly enough! However, planning trips has become part half of the fun. My passion from the planning, dreaming, and hopefully sometimes living out the experiences - with a bit of real life tossed in - is shared here.

Sunday, February 19, 2017

What a day this has been! We began the day with a cloudy and somewhat drizzly start in Durnstein, and a trek up to the ruins of the castle where Richard the Lionheart was held captive! Then after exploring the quaint little town, got to sail through the beautiful Wachau Valley enjoying the sites, and now this afternoon, we would be spending the remainder of the day in Melk! Melk is where the Danube and Melk rivers meet at the base of the Wachau Valley. It's perhaps best known for the 900 year old Benedictine abbey, which has 365 windows - one for each day of the year! So, we'd be off to tour this abbey this afternoon!

The Abbey was rebuilt in the 18th century, after the original 12th century building was destroyed by fire.

Our guide gave us the history of the abbey, the frescoes and the imperial rooms.

There were beautiful views from the windows and the balcony!

The building is undergoing a bit of a refurbishment!

The interior of the abbey's church is very grand - everything is red, orange and definitely gold!

We thought these were interesting!

After our tour of the abbey, we had some time on our own to walk through the town.

We did as we've done in pretty much every town, and got some ice cream, and wandered around! It seems like a nice thing to do in these little towns!

It really seems that no matter where you are though, you can see the abbey overlooking the town!

We had a lovely walk back to our boat.... what a beautiful afternoon!

But the day still wasn't over! Tonight we had a special dinner! It was the "Taste of Austria" dinner!

Tonight's dinner was going to be a party! All of the tables had this little set up on them, and it was sort of an Oktoberfest atmosphere!

The buffet had all different types of Austrian food on it tonight!

The staff provided us with some dinner entertainment!

And of course there was beer, lots of beer!

And dancing!

Everyone really enjoyed this evening - the food, the entertainment, and the company. It was very well done!

When we got back to our cabin, we had a little friend join us! And tonight we went through a tight lock! Some have asked just how close the boats get to the locks....here is a good example!

That's our cabin door open with the lock wall right there. I'd say it's maybe 4-6 inches from the boat.

I find the locks fascinating, apparently, Alex has gotten used to them - just another lock mom! He's involved in the movie he's watching!Today was a great day aboard the Viking Vilhjalm. We only have a couple more days left, which is always sad! But we were really looking forward to tomorrow! Another big day awaits!